Every week countless trailers go unnoticed or unreported. Trailer’s are an art form in itself, and can be just as entertaining, if not sometimes more, than the actual films, so they deserve their own recognition. That’s why every week we sort through them for you guys, and put the ones we feel you should watch here in our Trailer Roundup.
Continue reading Trailer Roundup: LSD Trips, Wall Punching, China Treachery, & Much More
After much speculation, Star Wars Episode VII has officially been moved from its summer 2015 release date to December 18th of that year. This comes on the verge of last week’s news of the writer change-up with J.j Abrams and Episode’s 5 & 6 writer Lawrence Kasdan taking over from Michael Arndt (Toy Story 3). The film’s plot is still tightly under the wraps, but rumors have it that Abrams was very unsatisfied with the initial draft, and felt a need to speed up production to hit its original summer date. Thankfully though, he’ll now get an extra few months to polish up the film and deliver a worthy inclusion to the Star Wars Saga.
Alan Horn, the chairmen of The Walt Disney Studios said in his press release,
[quote]”We’re very excited to share the official 2015 release date for Star Wars: Episode VII, where it will not only anchor the popular holiday filmgoing season but also ensure our extraordinary filmmaking team has the time needed to deliver a sensational picture”.[/quote]
Not only does the report give a release date, it also gives an estimated shooting date and location, which means they’ll also get an extra few months on the effects heavy post production,
[quote]Shooting is scheduled to begin spring 2014 at Pinewood Studios.[/quote]
All in all, this is great news. Yes, it won’t be hitting the usual May release that all previous 6 films have, but it’ll give Abrams more time to deliver a quality picture instead of a rushed one. While this film is almost destined to make bank, it doesn’t hurt that it be separated from the surplus of blockbusters due to hit summer 2015.
This list is long so bear with me: The Fantastic Four reboot, the video game adaptation Assassin’s Creed, Edgar Wright’s ‘Ant Man’, The Terminator reboot, the sequel Jurassic World, the sequel The Avengers: Age of Ultron, the sequel to Independence Day, the sequel Batman vs. Superman, Ted 2, and lastly Guillermo Del Toro’s Crimson Peak.
Wow. That is a lot. Now to be fair, the majority of those, besides the Marvel films (which are pretty much locked in), are bound to change in some form. But still, even half those in one summer would be a little insane. Would I like them all to be released? Hell yeah, to see all those one after another, but the film business is about money, so putting them back to back could really hamper their box office, and dissolve chances of more big blockbusters being produced. On the other hand, Star Wars Episode VII will now be in the clear for its pre-Christmas release date.
With the success of Marvel properties being turned into movies (such as Iron Man, Captain America and The Avengers) fans have been hungry for more. When ABC dropped the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., it opened up new doors when the show became a modest hit. Seeing the increasing popularity of these Marvel-tinged movies and shows, Netflix has ordered four Marvel shows to premiere on their streaming service.
Continue reading Netflix & Marvel Studios Team Up for Four Shows in 2015
Almost exactly a year since the release of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, the follow-up is set to debut. Once again directed by Peter Jackson, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug picks up immediately after its predecessor, continuing the journey of Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit, who reluctantly teams up with a group of Dwarves and the great wizard Gandalf to retrieve their gold from the vicious dragon Smaug.
The majority of the cast from the first film returns, Martin Freeman (Sherlock), Ian McKellen (X-Men), and Hugo Weaving (The Matrix) to name a few, but the more exciting news is the additions to the cast that include Benedict Cumberbatch (Star Trek Into Darkness, Sherlock), returning LOTR’s star Orlando Bloom, and Fast & Furious 6 villain Luke Evans. The trailer’s a bit long, coming in around 3 minutes, but it does a pretty stellar job of showcasing the scale of this film. While I wasn’t that excited before, this trailer’s finally convinced me. Check it out:
This trailer is pretty awesome, but what scares me is the trailer for the first Hobbit was pretty damn good too. Going into that knowing this series was set up for a trilogy, I found I was able to simply enjoy it and have fun, without looking for an actually fulfilling story. That worked cause it was simply setting up the characters, but at the same time, it led on that it’d be this epic journey, when in actuality it was a small adventure. This again looks to be an epic journey, and hopefully it can skip the exposition of teaching us the characters, and move past seceding the story to preserve for the third film. Also, the addition of Cumberbatch is always welcomed. Even in voice alone, he is a force to reckon with, and makes me that much more excited for the film.
Lastly, it’ll be interesting to see the ticket sales this time around for the HFR (48 Frames per a second) because last year people were selecting to see it that way to check out this “new form of cinema”, but this time they most likely have an opinion on it (and most likely negative). To me, I didn’t mind it too much, I thought the scenes of character’s faces and of the landscape were beautiful, but the special effects stood out like a sour thumb, and the majority of people I’ve talked to really disliked it.
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is due out December 13th.
In the early 90’s anime was starting to come into the United States. There were dealers at conventions raking in serious dough by offering VHS copies of anime series. One of the shows that I was exposed to in this time was a show called Patlabor. The series focused on a division of the Tokyo police department that dealt with giant robot crimes. These robots, called “Labors”, had various functions from military to construction. Patlabor had a 47 episode TV series with 16 episodes for an OAV and three movies, so it’s safe to say it was very popular during its run. Now the folks at Special Vehicles Section 2 are getting a new series and the best part is it is going to be live action!
The new show is going to focus on all-new faces, but Chief Shigeo Shiba, the character in charge of labor maintenance in the original series, will reprise his role and even be voiced by the original actor, Shigeru Chiba. There are going to be twelve 50 minute episodes a movie is slated to follow the series in 2015.
One of the best things about this live action series? They made a 1:1 scale replica of the labor for this show! There are pictures depicting what looks to be an AV-98 Ingram and it towers over the cast (See below). I would expect that the live action show will feature large-scale CGI battles with the labors, but it was a combination of action, story and likeable characters that bound the original series together and made it special. We’ll have to wait until sometime next year to see exactly how the new Patlabor compares, as it won’t be out until 2014 in Japan.
Renny Harlin (Cliffhanger, Die Hard 2) is back to work on his newest project, Hercules: The Legend Begins. The film will explore the origins of the fictional Hercules, son of Zeus. The plot centers around Hercules being exiled and fighting his way home to the woman he loves, Hebe, despite her being promised to his brother.
Kellan Lutz is set to star as the titular Hercules, but this won’t be Lutz’s first Greek mythological rodeo – you may remember him as Poseidon in the 2011 movie Immortals. He also took to the big screen in the cash cow Twilight trilogy as Emmett Cullen, so it’s safe to say Lutz’s screen presence won’t be an issue. However, there is a five hundred-pound elephant in the room – An itty bitty Brett Ratner film starring Dwayne Johnson. I think, wait, no I’m sure it’s called Hercules: The Thracian Wars. Yeah, that’s definitely it. Both films are coming out in 2014, so it will be very interesting to see which movie steals the other’s thunder.
I think it’s safe to say The Rock isn’t gonna be upstaged by anyone. We’re several years removed from the Tooth Fairy, and I don’t see a return to those days any time soon. Not to mention the budgets for both films are wildly different: Thracian Wars is coming in at approximately $110 million, as opposed to The Legend Begins‘s modest $70 million. Money certainly doesn’t guarantee a movie’s quality, and doesn’t always guarantee box office success, so the $40 million discrepancy doesn’t necessarily point to The Legend Begins‘s demise (I invite you to read up on a feature film titled Cutthroat Island if you dispute that claim). We’ll have to wait until both films have hit theatres to see who wins out in the end.
The producers of The Legend Begins are aiming for a mixture of Gladiator and 300, however I’m also seeing remnants of Starz TV’s Spartacus. What’s unfortunate is many writers and critics are giving this film a bad rap already, solely based on the trailer. Judging a movie nine months before a release is a bold move. Keep in mind, before you follow the opinions of these critics, that trailers don’t always fall in line with the overall quality of the movie. Some of the most satisfying movies are the ones with the least revealing trailers. I hope it gets a fair shake and it looks like it has potential to satisfy fans of this genre.
Grizzly Bomb 