Despite the censors and lackluster reviews, 2011's Hong Kong softcore period piece 3D Sex and Zen went on to make money. So naturally, producer Stephen Shiu wants to up the ante. A sequel entitled 4D Sex and Zen: Slayer of a Thousand from the Mysterious East is being plotted to include the added in-theater experience of vibrating seats. I mean, of course! How have the folks at D-Box not figured out how to capitalize on the erotic fourth dimension already? [Yahoo! Phillippines via Twitch Film]
Forget John Carter's controversial budget woes and terrible tracking for a minute; Wrath of the Titans has been threatening to be the first big biff of 2012 since it was announced, thanks largely to its poorly received predecessor, Clash of the Titans. The sequel's initial Marilyn Manson-themed trailer didn't help, either, but Warner Bros. have thankfully tightened things (and stopped lingering on Sam Worthington's Kenny Powers 'do) for a new trailer that actually promises some fantastic CG creature work. Bring on the lava monster thingy!
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Speaking with MTV, producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura confirmed general details on a fourth planned movie in Paramount's Oscar-nominated Transformers series, which will indeed see Michael Bay returning behind the camera. (First, however, he may finally shoot his bodybuilding crime pic Pain & Gain.) Though it's expected we'll see main robot characters like Optimus Prime return, summer of 2014's Transformers 4 -- Trans4mers? Tr4nsformers? -- will be a reboot, di Lorenzo says, because of course we need a Transformers reboot already. Of course. [MTV]
What's that? Adam Sandler's Grown Ups was a comedy and not technically a horror concoction/exercise in torture dreamed up to keep children and adults up at night? Well, that doesn't make this report any less frightening: According to ComingSoon, a sequel to the Dennis Dugan-directed 2010 buddy pic, about four immature grown men acting like children while on retreat with their families, already has a release date of July 12, 2013. Duh duh duhhhhhn. Well, Grown Ups did make $271M worldwide. Eh, at least it's not Jack and Jill 2. Mark your calendars accordingly. [ComingSoon]
Twelve years after critics found it to be totally decent (and refreshingly stereotype-free) and audiences made it a solid $34M box office hit, the 1999 Taye Diggs vehicle Best Man will be getting a sequel! So if you've been holding your breath to find out what happens after interpersonal secrets and scandals among friends come to a head on one dramarama-filled wedding day, you're in luck. Writer-director Malcolm D. Lee is set to script and helm Best Man 2 for Universal, and reportedly got the idea after a cast reunion dinner; take that as good indication that the likes of Diggs, Morris Chestnut, Terrence Howard, Sanaa Nathan, and Nia Long might reprise their characters. [Deadline]
Accepting an award last weekend at George Mason University, novelist Stephen King treated the audience to a reading of a passage from Dr. Sleep, his still-in-progress follow-up to The Shining. Remember little Danny Torrance, running from his deranged father (Jack Nicholson) in Stanley Kubrick's 1980 film version? Well, Danny's all grown up now, using his gift to help people die peacefully. And there are vampires, because why not?
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Today at Fantastic Fest, Movieline got its hands on a VHS tape labeled "September 1988," packaged in an unmarked manila envelope. Perhaps (probably) not coincidentally, the date corresponds to recently released footage from Paranormal Activity 3, the forthcoming found footage prequel about spooky goings-on in the lives of a family haunted by unseen forces. Could this have something to do with tomorrow's hotly anticipated secret screening?
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"No, I have no idea about any of it. All I know is that it doesn't preclude Paul [Greengrass] and me from doing another one of ours," original Bourne series star Matt Damon teased recently when asked if he'd show up to pass the torch to Jeremy Renner in Tony Gilroy's 2012 sequel The Bourne Legacy. Cheeky as that answer is, Damon was quick to play nice anyhow. "He's got a whole other thing that they're doing and I wish them well," he added, "and Tony [Gilroy's] really smart. I'm sure they're going to be great." So, no hard feelings. Really. [MTV]
Ever since deranged Dutch filmmaker Tom Six announced that Human Centipede 2 would make his original mouth-to-anus picture "look like a Disney film," we have been anxiously awaiting video evidence. After seeing this week's Australian teaser debut, IFC Films has granted us a first trailer for The Human Centipede 2: Full Sequence, which has already been banned in the U.K. So guys, hold on tight to your Human Centipede charm necklaces and click through -- except for you, Donnie Wahlberg.
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Earlier today came word that Chuck Norris and Jean-Claude Van Damme might be joining Sly Stallone & Co. for The Expendables 2 (although the reported cast listing at Millenium Films now reads "TBA"). Now it seems Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis are onboard to reprise their cameos from the first film, with bigger parts this time around. (Expanded Expendables!) So let's just take a minute and regroup: Who isn't onboard or under consideration to join the beefy action sequel?
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It has been ten years since Mike Myers last brought his swingin' 'tude and awful dentistry to international man of mystery Austin Powers, and perhaps for good reason -- by the time Myers rolled around the 1970s with Beyonce's Foxxy Cleopatra in 2002's Austin Powers in Goldmember, the series had lost some of its driving mojo. Now, after taking a decade to recharge, the franchise is said to be headed back to the spotlight with a new sequel, according to a report by HitFix's Drew McWeeny.
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Oh, lovely: After staging his body-stitching horror pic The Human Centipede (First Sequence) in Germany and getting banned in the U.K. for upping the twisted thrills (and the number of victims) in the Britain-set Human Centipede II (Full Sequence), director Tom Six plans to finish his trilogy in the good old U.S.A. "We're going to shoot the third film entirely in America and it's going to be my favorite," he said during the Empire Presents... Big Screen event in London, where he promised that the threequel would "make the last one look like a Disney film." Hold onto your asses, America. [Empire via Twitch]
Director Justin Lin had no idea how well his supercharged sequel Fast Five would go on to perform back when he was filming it -- but he [Edit. correction: prepped] a 12-minute sequence for a sixth Fast & Furious film (his next upcoming production) just in case: "I already have a 12-minute sequence done. I did it just as an exercise. I had it done before we were finished with Fast Five, actually. So I wanted to do that just to have it there and to be honest with you, I didn't know if I was going to do a Fast Six. I didn't know if people were going to embrace Fast Five and we were going to have an opportunity. But I felt like I really wanted to make sure that the last scene, which I had talked to Vin [Diesel] about countless times -- I wanted to make sure that was done." [Box Office Magazine]
Almost all of the original American Pie gang is back for American Reunion -- even MILF Guy Number 2 himself, John Cho -- but producer Craig Perry admits it took a while for some of the cast to get over what the series had become: "As much as you say that the people maybe wanted to put that behind them, age and distance have made them realize that it's their legacy, and you can either disavow it or embrace it and be happy," he tells Box Office Magazine. However, Perry promises, Stifler will be more of a human being this time around. Wait a minute -- Stifler, the buffoon who ingests all manner of disgusting crap accidentally for our entertainment, a fully-fleshed out character? What fun is that? [Box Office Magazine]
Deep down in your soul, you knew it was coming as soon as The Smurfs stood toe-to-toe with Cowboys & Aliens at the box office: Sony has staked out Aug. 2, 2013 for the release of Smurfs 2, a sequel to this summer's popular CG reboot. A plot and director has yet to be announced, but Neil Patrick Harris did promise Movieline he'd float the idea of bringing in a socialist Smurfy slant should sequels happen. Make it so, NPH. [Deadline]
