Now here are some mutants ready for an 8 × 11 frame and a parent-chaperoned prom. The freaks of X-Men: First Class turn at photogenic angles and flash us pert, senior-year expressions in their new international posters. You think Azazel, Magneto, Mystique and Riptide would give amazing yearbook quotes? "Music speaks what cannot be expressed -- and so does humanoid intergalactic violence." Check out the one-sheets.
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I've been waiting for updates on the Candy Land movie for too long. Seriously. Sure, the board game is a luck-based exercise in colored cards and turn-taking, but the characters in the enchanted gumdrop forest aren't terrible ideas for film characters. Queen Frostine, anyone? The wicked sorcerer Lord Licorice? Emily Blunt and Adrien Brody, respectively! But a new bit of news casts a sugary pall on the proceedings: The film may be a candy-fied take on Lord of the Rings.
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The town of Shelby, NC is playing host to Gary Ross's The Hunger Games production this week, and local news is all aflutter with the goings-on around set. The Shelby Star has footage and pics from what appears to be a warehouse bearing the markings of District 12 -- home of Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta (Josh Hutcherson). Get your first look after the jump!
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If you always thought that The Little Mermaid's sixteen-year-old Ariel would benefit from a dark Hollywood reimagining in which she is forced to realize that life isn't all underwater sing-alongs, it's your lucky day. Sony was thinking the same thing and -- in the same vein as Hollywood's dramatic Snow White reboots -- has announced a grim new twist on the Hans Christian Andersen fairytale.
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Speaking on a panel at Dallas Comic-Con over the weekend, Stan Lee was asked about the famous cameos he's come to be known for in adaptations of his work. Downplaying the fact that Matthew Vaughn never called him to cameo in X-Men: First Class, Lee told fans to look forward to his turn in another blockbuster this summer: "Wait 'til you see me in Captain America!" And then, he proceeded to spoil his cameo in Marc Webb's just-wrapped The Amazing Spider-Man.
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Holy Stratford-upon-Van der Woodsen: One of your beloved Gossip Girl cast members is joining a new adaptation of a Shakespearean classic. Which of the bug-eyed popular kids could it be? Is Blake Lively stirring it up as Regan in King Lear? Will Chace Crawford reveal more pounds of flesh (in a shirtless way?) as Antonio in The Merchant of Venice? Or will Leighton Meester play a pretty tree in A Midsummer Night's Dream? The answer lies within.
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With just over three weeks until the 17th annual Los Angeles Film Festival -- not that we're counting or anything -- event organizers have announced that Bernie, Richard Linklater's latest collaboration with Jack Black, will open the festivities. The dark comedy stars Black as a beloved Texas undertaker who remains popular in his small town even after committing a crime. See why Black's mustachioed mortician is so irresistible ahead.
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Writer Joe Hill (Heart-Shaped Box, Locke & Key) has sold adaptation rights to his short story Twittering from the Circus of the Dead, a horror tale told from the Tweets of a teenage girl as her road-tripping family runs across a zombie circus. Todd Lincoln (the forthcoming The Apparition) will direct from a script by Chris Borelli; sample Hill's tale, 140 words at a time, by following fictional heroine Blake Teller (@TYME2WASTE) on the Twitter. LOL ZOM (BIE) G! [THR]
Boston Globe film critic Ty Burr confirms what you may have already noticed at your local chain multiplex: picture quality sucks, and an unspoken company cost-cutting policy is to blame. Thanks to a perfect storm of practices uncovered at an AMC Loews in Boston, endemic to the company and other chains -- going cheap on projection, sweetheart deals with Sony, sheer laziness -- ticket buyers are getting shafted at 2-D screenings dimmed by 50 to 85 percent brightness.
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Rumor has it that Cannes jury focker Robert De Niro may work with Martin Scorsese, again, and star in The Comedian, a portrait of an insult comic written by producer Art Linson with help from Friars Club roastmaster Jeffrey Ross. Of course, De Niro and Scorsese collaborated on another comedian story, The King of Comedy, in 1982 -- and that's when I liked Jerry Lewis for a few minutes! Do you think that film still ranks among both De Niro and Scorsese's most underrated works?
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· If you needed another reminder that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II is the final chapter of the world-beloved franchise, the latest poster for the film is here to lend a hand. In 72-point. Click ahead for a peek at what the end looks like, then stick around for more Buzz Break.
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With a mere 33 percent Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, it's safe to say that Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides will not go down in history as one of Jerry Bruckheimer's most critically accepted productions. (Check out Stephanie Zacharek's review here.) Yet that begs the question: Just which Bruckeimer-produced film was the most critically acclaimed? Was it The Rock? The earnest Remember the Titans? Something you might not even remember Bruckheimer produced?
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Tilda Swinton may not have won Best Actress at the 64th annual Festival de Cannes, but that doesn't mean her lauded work in We Need to Talk About Kevin will be forgotten come Oscar time. Oscilloscope has acquired the film for North American release, with eyes to release it during awards season this winter. That gives them plenty of time to start planning those For Your Consideration ads! [Deadline]
Real Steel, which opens in theaters Oct. 7, is to futuristic robot boxing what Breaking Away is to cycling -- an unpretentious, working class story of strife and triumph! Hugh Jackman plays a washed-up fighter who uses his last few bucks to gather scrap metal and construct the ultimate robo-pugilist. His son (Dakota Goyo) serves as his partner. Co-starring Evangeline, Anthony Mackie, and Kevin Durand, Real Steel will give us something unusual and gritty this fall -- sort of a dystopian exploration of Comedy Central's old show Battlebots -- and the new poster promises a fistful of metallic angst.
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"You know, I had a very funny conversation with Martin Scorsese, who is a very, very polite man. He said, 'The beginning of Antichrist was so beautiful.' You know, the prelude to my movie. And I said to him, 'Yes, but it was black-and-white and slo-mo. How can you go wrong?' And then I said to myself, 'Oh, shit -- this is the man that made Raging Bull!' But he laughed and said, 'You are right.'" [Salon via Looker]
